Question
hello Gary,
my name is don and im a 41yr old union ironworker,been doing ironwork for almost 20yrs.i was recently diagnosed with degenerative disc disease,diffuse disc bulges,facet and ligamentum flavum hypertrophy,foraminal stenosis.i talked to my neurologist and he told me to find another career,but ironwork is all i know and it pays well,so my question to you is can this diagnoses keep me out of ironwork? im a big guy and i have noticed that im not on my A game at work anymore and i got laid off 6-6-12 and havent worked since,ironwork is a young mans game but im only 41...what would be my options is this something i can get over and continue working,thanks alot

Answer
Hello,

Okay,  so I think there is a pretty good chance that you can get back to your functional self, but you will probably have to do a little more maintenance on your body to stay in "the young man's game" of ironwork.

Basically, you need to release the inappropriately tight muscles in your hips and upper legs, so that your back muscles can let go once they're not being pulled on anymore by those bigger strong muscle groups.  I show you exactly how to do this completely for free, in videos, right here on my website. Again, they're all free:
http://www.do-it-yourself-joint-pain-relief.com/lower-back-pain-relief.html
this will help too:
http://www.do-it-yourself-joint-pain-relief.com/lower-back-pain-remedy.html
this will help as well:
http://www.do-it-yourself-joint-pain-relief.com/lower-back-pain-remedy-tennis-ba

Since you're an ironworker, I think you probably have a pretty good understanding of structure.  A body is a structure, just like a building, or a bridge, or the masts of a sailboat with all the rigging attached.

Here's the deal.  Most of the negative structural effects of aging are due to the shortening and tightening of your tissue negatively affecting your structure. Just like those buildings and bridges you build, if the beams (like bones and discs) are not properly positioned then they take on more stress than they were designed to take on and start breaking down.

So when your tissue gets tight it pulls the bones out of position, and if they're big muscle groups that are tight, they can torque your entire structure out of position.  And quite often, just like the rigging on a big old sailboat, when the big pieces of rigging (muscles) get tight, it the smaller pieces of rigging that snap and break, or get stressed, like your low back muscles.

As we age we get tighter more easily, BUT you can manually release the tight tissue if someone just shows you how.

My point in saying all of the above, is that I'll bet dollars to donuts that the muscles in your hips and upper legs are REALLY tight.  When they get tight they pull your hip bones and tailbone out of their ideal position and lock them in that position.  Your low back muscles are now engaged in a tug of war they will never win against these bigger muscle groups, so your lower back muscles tighten (and inflame) in an attempt to keep your structure stable.
Releasing the right muscle groups will just restore the appropriate space and freedom in your joints that you naturally enjoyed when you were 20 years old. Not you just need to do some manual manipulation on yourself everyone once in a while to maintain that freedom.

So watch the free videos on my website, just follow along, and I think you'll be able to set yourself free and continue the work you love.

I hope this helps.

Gary